


Birds of a Feather

by Rosie447



Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Crows, Denial of Feelings, F/M, Gen, Light Angst, Post-Crooked Kingdom, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-24
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2019-01-22 05:21:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12474396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosie447/pseuds/Rosie447
Summary: Kaz remembers how Inej used to sit on his window, tossing breadcrumbs to the crows. Both of them struggle to adjust to her absence.





	Birds of a Feather

The crows were back again, waiting to be fed.  
Kaz closed his eyes, his grip tightening over his fountain pen as their gentle pecking against the back window slowly drove him to madness. They were supposed to be smarter than this, he thought. They should have realized long ago she wasn’t there. He paused, hoping that if he waited long enough, they would decide to go elsewhere. The crows remained. Their beaks beating against the roofing, attempting to grasp for phantom grain.  
Kaz set the pen on his desk and allowed himself a long-suffering sigh. He never used to be this easily distracted. If he was being honest, the pecking bothered him more than it should have. The crows had grown used to the comforts of having Inej there, tossing them breadcrumbs. They’d grown fat and comfortable, their own instincts dulling as they knew she’d be there to provide for them. They kept returning to his window, making that saints forsaken noise, as if one day she’d simply have not gone. As if one day they’d be looking out over the pier and feel her gentle presence, warm fingers interlocked with leather gloves.  
He couldn’t get any work done in this environment.  
He decided to move his things to Per Haskell’s old office. It was bigger anyways.

* * *

Either they’d followed him, or Kaz Brekker has grossly underestimated the number of crows that frequented this area. Either way, it was growing more difficult to concentrate with each passing day. He’d shut the window and drawn the blinds, leaving the room dark enough that he needed a candle to read, even in daylight. He could still hear them, though. Incessant pecking interspersed with the fluttering of wings.

He tried to drown out the noise by drumming his fingers on the wood lacquer of the desk.  
“Kaz?”  
He looked up from the log book, scowling.  
“Yes?”  
Jesper seemed to think better of what he’d been about to say.  
“Nevermind.”  
Kaz nodded coolly and turned back to his notes as the sharpshooter left his office. He was alone again, with nothing but the pecking in the background.

* * *

 It took a week before his stubborn indifference began to crumble.  
He yanked back the curtain.  
“She’s not here,” he told them. “And she’s not coming back.”  
Two of the crows looked at him, unimpressed. One continued preening as if he hadn’t spoken at all.  
“You need to learn to fend for yourself,” he told them, his voice low. He didn’t need the whole slat to know he was talking to crows. “Did you think she was going to stay forever?”  
The crows did not respond.  
They did respond, a few moments later, when he threw an inkwell at them. Most of them fluttered away, in the standoffish fashion of birds. One took a few steps in the dark ink, pecking at the shattered glass as if it might be translucent bread. Kaz retracted all his previous statements about crows being clever.

* * *

 Inej had been gone for two weeks, and Kaz was almost certain that with each passing day, the crows at his window grew louder. It struck him as incredibly pathetic that they continued to wait for her. Inej had better things to do with her life than offer breadcrumbs to crows. He’d heard her plans, seen the fierce look of commitment in her eyes as she planned her routes. She was going to singlehandedly dismantle the slave trade. She was better than the Barrel. She deserved to get out and never look back.  
The crows were wasting their time.  
Kaz set down his spice roll. He’d purchased it as a means to initiate a conversation with a potential client and was currently deciding whether or not he intended to actually eat it. In addition to the typical pecking, one of the crows on his roof began to caw. Kaz thudded his cane on the floor enough to cause his desk to twitch. Another crow, or perhaps the same one, repeated the call.  
“Fine,” he muttered. He yanked back the curtain. “Fine.” He threw the spice roll onto the rooftop, watching it crumble and smear upon impact. “Take your bread and go away! She’s got better things to do than waste time catering to Barrel scum.”  
As the birds - the stupid, obnoxious birds - began pecking at the roof, Kaz tried to ignore the uncomfortable question of whom he actually angry with.  
He didn’t get much work done that afternoon.

* * *

Inej Ghafa had made herself a promise once; she would never try to sneak up on Kaz again. Everything she saw of him, she thought, had to be what he chose to show her. She would not drive herself mad trying to connect with a boy who donned a mask every time she walked into the room.  
It was accidental, then, when she returned to Ketterdam and spotted them. A murder of crows, and their chief murderer. Kaz was perched on the windowsill to his old office, his crisp suit an inky black that matched that of his feathered companions. The crows were assembled, pecking the roof, their beaks curved as if to match the thoughtful scowl of their feeder. She recalled a saying her father used to tell her, about birds of a feather.  
Inej leaned against a nearby wall, watching quietly, her mouth curved in a mixture of amusement and a happy melancholy she couldn’t quite define. For all his cleverness, she doubted Kaz has ever realized that the crows had never been waiting for her at all.


End file.
